Access Optical Networks (AON; Manalapan, NJ), in collaboration with Princeton University (Princeton, NJ) and the California Institute of Technology (Caltech; Pasadena, CA), is developing and producing what it says is the next generation of nanophotonic data storage (N-PDS) technologies. This holographic N-PDS platform, which Laser Focus World first reported on in early 2012, uses lasers that read, rewrite, and transfer data bits stored in volumetric photorefractive crystals. The memory product's development is on track to reach its 1.2 Tbyte data storage density with 1 Gbit/s read and rewrite performance—with significant benefits over blue laser and Tapestry holographic storage media from Akonia Holographics (Longmont, CO), who acquired InPhase Technologies.
AON is making substantial progress on a $20 million funding round, with commitments from private equity groups and strategic partners for half of the funds raised and plans to close on the final balance of funding by August 2015. The funds will allow commercialization of its N-PDS technology during the next 30 months. Currently, AON's N-PDS technology is the only nonvolatile optical data storage device that can be clean-erased in minutes with no residual data that would enable forensic recovery—important for high-performance computing and cyber-security systems. The technology also supports data tagging using phase coding and/or polarization coding, and enables optical search techniques such as facial recognition and geospatial applications—including urban and rural topographic extraction and pattern matching.
Contact Glenn A. Gladney at [email protected]; see http://bit.ly/1cQFCvm.
Gail Overton | Senior Editor (2004-2020)
Gail has more than 30 years of engineering, marketing, product management, and editorial experience in the photonics and optical communications industry. Before joining the staff at Laser Focus World in 2004, she held many product management and product marketing roles in the fiber-optics industry, most notably at Hughes (El Segundo, CA), GTE Labs (Waltham, MA), Corning (Corning, NY), Photon Kinetics (Beaverton, OR), and Newport Corporation (Irvine, CA). During her marketing career, Gail published articles in WDM Solutions and Sensors magazine and traveled internationally to conduct product and sales training. Gail received her BS degree in physics, with an emphasis in optics, from San Diego State University in San Diego, CA in May 1986.